Tag: 24-hours-of-leopard

Feature: Dictionary How it works: Find a word you don't know the meaning of, launch the app, find the meaning, and rejoice. But that's not all! The new and improved Dictionary in Leopard defines words, it is true, but it also shows you Wikipedia information about whatever term you searched for. Dic...

Feature: AutoFS How it works: AutoFS isn't sexy, but it does correct one of the longest standing issues with OS X: connecting to network volumes always brings the Finder to its knees. No longer, folks, thanks to AutoFS. Network shares are now mounted on separate threads which means they won't take d...

Feature: iChat Recording How it works: Pretty much like anything else with a Record button -- you're on an audio or video iChat, you press that big red button, iChat thoughtfully notifies your participants that they're being recorded, and off you go. Audio gets saved as AAC and video as MPEG-4 (per...

Feature: Front Row is updated to work just like Apple TV, but on your computer. How it works: To tell the truth, I kind of liked the spinning icons of Front Row (and so did this kitten), but the Apple TV interface is nice, too. You can play all of your content (and even content streaming from othe...

Feature: The Guest user account How it works: You've got a friend (well, probably more than one, but for the purposes of this example, just one). Your friend, a curious and look-through-your-medicine-cabinet sort, needs to check his email and get some driving directions on your computer. Don't want ...

Feature: Safari 3 (out of beta!) How it works: Safari 3 is the third revision of Apple's web browser based on the open source Konqueror HTML rendering engine (also known as KHTML). Apple has open sourced its contributions to KHTML under the WebKit moniker. Safari 3 adds a host of new features to Ap...

Feature: Spotlight How it works: Spotlight was another Tiger innovation that just never quite lived up to its billing. It was hobbled by slowdowns and some bad design decisions on Apple's part regarding what sort of searches you could run. While it's a bit too early to say if it's substantially fas...

Feature: The new Finder How it works: People have been complaining about the Finder since OS X was first released. Finally, Leopard brings a variety of long-awaited features. Perhaps most important is the one-two punch Quick Look and Cover Flow, but there are a many other new features as well. The ...

Feature: Alex, the new voice of Mac OS X How it works: Voice synthesis on the Mac has been around for more than 20 years now, but outside of screenreading and special applications it's never been a marquee feature (that is, if you don't count Talking Moose -- now once again available for OS X. Woot...

Feature: Quick Look How it works: Quick Look has the potential to change the way Mac users interact with their computers. It brings super-quick access to your files by allowing you to preview a variety of files without opening them in their associated applications. Instead of opening a file by dou...

Feature: The new and improved Automator. How it works: When Tiger was released Automator was a highly touted new feature, and though it's certainly developed a certain fan base on sites like Automator.us and MacScripters, I can't help but feel like it hasn't quite not taken off the way Apple had hop...

Feature: Back to My Mac How it works: For Leopard-running .Mac users who roam away from home, Back to my Mac provides a breadcrumb trail to the master machine. By registering the home IP address with the .Mac servers, B2mM lets you access your entire hard drive, transfer files, or control the scre...

Feature: Cover Flow in the Finder. How it works: Just like album Cover Flow in iTunes, Leopard brings the side-scrolling view to the Finder, allowing your "flip" through your files and see live previews (including paging through mutli-page documents and playing movies). Who will use it: Everyone...

Feature: UNIX certification: Sure, we're all for nonconfirmity in our non-computer lives--but when it comes to UNIX, specs matter. Leopard brings Open Brand UNIX 03 with SUSv3 and POSIX 1003.1 conformity.
How it works: That highly leaded UNIX runs as the core of your operating system. You never have...

Feature: Stacks, which are what Apple is calling clickable icons on the Dock that fold out to show other clickable icons. How it works: It's actually an updated implementation of the old "Piles" idea, in that you can have one icon that gives you access to lots of different things. But Apple's Stacks...